Is this the best wedding song ever?
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Fan favourites … Newlyweds had already waltzed to Forever Begins Tonight before the McClymonts sisters could perform it at Sam’s wedding. Picture: Bradley Hunter
Source: News Corp Australia
IT’S tough enough picking the perfect wedding song for the big day. So it has got to be one of the most daunting exercises to write one. For your sister.
When The McClymonts were wrapping up the writing sessions for their fourth record Here’s To You & I early last year, they decided to have a crack at penning a song to soundtrack the first dance at Sam’s wedding to her pilot beau Ben Poxon.
Mollie and Brooke were determined to compose something they could perform at the wedding, which happened in December at MONA in Tasmania.
With producer and renowned writer Lindsay Rimes, the three sisters came up with the gorgeous Forever Begins Again.
“We were looking at all the songs we have and realised we didn’t have a wedding. Sam getting married was huge and we didn’t have a song for that,” Mollie says.
“We were thinking about Shania Twain’s From This Moment, which is such an amazing song.
“Everyone loves a wedding song; they’re not going out of fashion any time soon.”
The four writers pictured the scene. Sam and Ben on the dancefloor, in each other’s arms, dancing together for the first time as Mr and Mrs Poxon.
“It came out in a half-hour. It was the quickest song ever,” Mollie says.
“Line after line, all in the moment.”
Oh happy day … Sam McClymont and Ben Poxon on their wedding day at MONA last year. Picture: Sarah Williams
Source: Supplied
Brooke recalls her sisters heading home from her writing “shed” and listening to it “more than 20 times” just to make sure it was “the song”.
But an unexpected road test confirmed their gut feel about the rightness of Forever Begins Again after the album was released in July, about five months before the big day.
Its first airing as a wedding song wasn’t at Sam and Ben’s nuptials.
Radio station Smoothfm randomly started playing it, they decided to release it as a single and then started receiving emails and messages that fans had chosen to use the song in their own weddings.
“We told people to go for it. Sam was totally OK with it, she’s so easy,” Brooke says.
But the eldest McClymont was a tad anxious about singing it with Mollie at the wedding.
“I think she thought other people would think it was weird that we were singing a McClymonts song but it wasn’t; it was about those two and it was incredible, such a goosebumps moment,” Mollie says.
The song may get another airing at a McClymont wedding with Mollie recently becoming engaged to her partner Aaron Blackburn.
The McClymonts have been writing, recording and touring together almost non-stop since they decided to form their sisterly trio almost a decade ago.
They have amassed a loyal fanbase and won the respect of their peers, adding two more Golden Guitars to their trophy cabinets for Highest Selling Album and Group Of The Year.
Like their peers Kasey Chambers and Keith Urban, the trio have been part of Australian country music’s crossover into the pop charts without shedding their intrinsic countryness.
Well supported … The McClymonts have been part of the vanguard taking country music to a younger audience. Picture Cameron Richardson.
Source: News Corp Australia
They have noticed the flow-on effect of those chart feats in the widening demographic at their shows.
Country artists will always include city venues on their tour schedules now when previously they were often bypassed.
“Taylor and Keith have brought a lot more attention, more spotlight to country music here but it is also a case of people bringing out good music, songs that people are connecting with and a good song will find its audience,” Brooke says.
“You realise who that audience is at the shows and we’ve noticed they are getting a lot younger, 20-year-olds are loving our music.”
With weddings, engagements and Brooke and husband Adam Eckerley’s daughter Tiggy to celebrate in the past couple of years, the McClymonts know how to schedule.
They aren’t out on the road five days a week anymore, which makes “gigging” even more enjoyable when they do it.
“It just becomes this job cycle when you are out there all the time so we really, really look forward to getting on a stage now,” Mollie says.
After their Forever Begins Tonight tour wraps mid year, the trio will start work on their fifth album.
“I think you can experiment a bit more with your fifth record and I am totally into writing with completely different people who come from different genres,” Brooke said.
The McClymonts perform at Dee Why RSL on February 13, Castle Hill RSL on February 20, Katoomba RSL on February 21, North Sydney Leagues Club on February 20, Hornsby RSL on February 28, Penrith Panthers on March 6, Wenty Leagues Club on March 7, and the Campfire Festival, Hope Estate Winery, Hunter Valley on March 13. For more tour dates, see www.themcclymonts.net.au
